WordPress is a fantastic platform
for building and managing websites. It’s user friendly and has seemingly
endless functionality. But everything can’t just be built into your WordPress
theme. No worries – in many cases there’s a plugin for the capability you need.
Every
WordPress developer has a toolkit of plugins they can’t live without that
usually includes solutions for caching, security and adding other improvements
that build on WordPress core.
Built-in functionality within a
WordPress theme isn’t always a bad thing, but having every feature plus the
kitchen sink built-in can cause some headaches. This makes the code
ridiculously long and complex, which can slow down your site, and you often end
up with many unused features that you never needed in the first place. Also, if
you ever decide to switch to a new theme you could run into some problems such
as losing content for features not supported by your new theme.
Plugins make it easy to pick and
choose the features you need. Plus you can take the plugin (and any related
content) with you if you ever decide to update to a new WordPress theme.
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W3 Total Cache
W3
Total Cache is one of the most popular caching plugins for WordPress.
Caching is the best way to easily improve your users experience without
having to make change to your site’s content.
A well-regarded alternative is WP Super Cache, which is often thought of as an easier version of W3 Total Cache.
A well-regarded alternative is WP Super Cache, which is often thought of as an easier version of W3 Total Cache.
Jetpack
Jetpack
supercharges your site with a collection of powerful features, such as
site stats, email subscriptions, forms, social networking and more.
The latest version of Jetpack introduced support for Multisite. In the past, super admins had to manage the connections on an individual site basis, even though Jetpack could be activated network-wide. Now you can administer all your connections from your super admin accounts.
The latest version of Jetpack introduced support for Multisite. In the past, super admins had to manage the connections on an individual site basis, even though Jetpack could be activated network-wide. Now you can administer all your connections from your super admin accounts.
Akismet
Akismet
is the grand daddy of spam plugins. This plugin checks your site’s
comments against the Akismet web service to see if they look like spam
or not and then lets you review the spam it catches in the “Comments”
section of the WordPress admin area.
Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web service to see if they look like spam or not and lets you review the spam it catches under your blog’s “Comments” admin screen.
Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web service to see if they look like spam or not and lets you review the spam it catches under your blog’s “Comments” admin screen.
Google Analytics +
Google Analytics + lets you track and view Google Analytics statistics for your single or Multisite installation.
This plugin puts all the important statistics right in front of you with beautiful charts and graphs in your WordPress dashboard.
This plugin puts all the important statistics right in front of you with beautiful charts and graphs in your WordPress dashboard.
Google XML Sitemaps
This
plugin does a single job well: it generates an XML sitemap for your
sites, which helps search engines to better index your site.
Sitemaps make it easier for search engine crawlers to see the complete structure of your sites and retrieve it more efficiently. Google XML Sitemaps supports all kinds of WordPress generated pages and custom URLs, and also notifies search engines each time you post new content.
Sitemaps make it easier for search engine crawlers to see the complete structure of your sites and retrieve it more efficiently. Google XML Sitemaps supports all kinds of WordPress generated pages and custom URLs, and also notifies search engines each time you post new content.
iThemes Security (formerly Better WP Security)
Better WP Security has changed its name. This plugin provides more than 30 ways to securit and protect your site.
Features include:
- Obscurity: Changes the URLs for WordPress dashboard areas including login and admin
- Protect: Scans your site to instantly report where vulnerabilities exist and fixes them in seconds
- Detect: Detects bots and other attempts to search for vulnerabilities
- Recover: Makes regular backups of your WordPress database
Sucuri Security is another popular security plugin if you’re looking for an alternative to iTheme Security.
Features include:
- Obscurity: Changes the URLs for WordPress dashboard areas including login and admin
- Protect: Scans your site to instantly report where vulnerabilities exist and fixes them in seconds
- Detect: Detects bots and other attempts to search for vulnerabilities
- Recover: Makes regular backups of your WordPress database
Sucuri Security is another popular security plugin if you’re looking for an alternative to iTheme Security.
Contact Form 7
Easily
the most popular free forms plugin out there, Contact Form 7 has racked
up more than 16 millions downloads in the WordPress Plugin Repository.
This plugin can manage multiple contact forms, plus you can customize the form and any email content with simple markup. It also include support for AJAX-powered submission, CAPTCHA and Akismet spam filtering.
If you want to step things up a notch, Gravity Forms is a popular premium forms plugin.
This plugin can manage multiple contact forms, plus you can customize the form and any email content with simple markup. It also include support for AJAX-powered submission, CAPTCHA and Akismet spam filtering.
If you want to step things up a notch, Gravity Forms is a popular premium forms plugin.
Snapshot
Snapshot
is like Apple’s Time Machine, but for your WordPress site. This
easy-to-use plugin is Multisite compatible and allows you to back backup
snapshots of anything you want (settings, content, files etc) so you
can quickly restore your content at any time.
This plugin’s features include the ability to save your snapshots to Dropbox and Amazon S3.
Some popular alternatives include or BackWPup and BackupBuddy.
This plugin’s features include the ability to save your snapshots to Dropbox and Amazon S3.
Some popular alternatives include or BackWPup and BackupBuddy.
Limit Login Attempts
This is another great plugin that even one-click installer Softaculous allows you to install along with WordPress.
By default, WordPress allows unlimited login attempts either through the login page or by sending special cookies. Limit Login Attempts limits the rate of login attempts on your site, helping prevent brute-force hacking on your site.
By default, WordPress allows unlimited login attempts either through the login page or by sending special cookies. Limit Login Attempts limits the rate of login attempts on your site, helping prevent brute-force hacking on your site.
Ultimate Branding
White
label your site with Ultimate Branding. This fantastic plugin lets your
re-brand the entire WordPress admin area, from the admin to the
dashboard and the login page.
You can quickly and easily replace the WordPress logo with your own company logo, change favicons, add your own help content and remove all mentions of WordPress for your clients.
You can quickly and easily replace the WordPress logo with your own company logo, change favicons, add your own help content and remove all mentions of WordPress for your clients.
Appointments +
Appointments
+ is the most powerful, flexible and feature-rich plugin out there that
lets you to accept, set and manage your bookings on your site.
It’s a cinch to set up. We’ve got some cool aesthetic updates planned for this plugin later in the year so keep an eye out!
It’s a cinch to set up. We’ve got some cool aesthetic updates planned for this plugin later in the year so keep an eye out!
MarketPress eCommerce
MarketPress
sets the standard for WordPress eCommerce solutions, providing an
elegant shopping experience that supports all major payment gateways and
allows you to easily manage distribution and shopping costs with custom
shipping options.
Why spend thousands of dollars on cowboy-coded extensions and add-ons? There’s no need to purchase extra add-ons or special licenses when MarketPress brings together the power of dozens of different plugins in one solid standalone product.
WooCommerce is by far the most popular eCommerce plugin available, though MarketPress has some really exciting major updates planned for this year, so stay tuned.
Why spend thousands of dollars on cowboy-coded extensions and add-ons? There’s no need to purchase extra add-ons or special licenses when MarketPress brings together the power of dozens of different plugins in one solid standalone product.
WooCommerce is by far the most popular eCommerce plugin available, though MarketPress has some really exciting major updates planned for this year, so stay tuned.
Membership
Membership
allows you to easily create your very own membership site, like GigaOm,
Mixergy, PSD Tuts, or even The New York Times.
This easy to set up plugin lets you grant limited access to visitors and reserve premium content for paying users.
Membership has just undergone a major update, with huge changes planned this year that will make it even easier to use.
This easy to set up plugin lets you grant limited access to visitors and reserve premium content for paying users.
Membership has just undergone a major update, with huge changes planned this year that will make it even easier to use.
Pro Sites
Pro Sites give you the power to create your own profitable blog or site hosting network, like WordPress.com
You can offer your users the chance to upgrade their sites for a fee and access features like premium themes, plugins, extra storage, domain mapping or simply removing advertising.
This is a powerful plugin and definitely worth checking out.
You can offer your users the chance to upgrade their sites for a fee and access features like premium themes, plugins, extra storage, domain mapping or simply removing advertising.
This is a powerful plugin and definitely worth checking out.
Yet Another Related Posts Plugin
YARPP
displays pages, posts and custom post types related to the current
post, introducing your readers to other relevant content on your site.
Exposing visitors to related posts is a great way to encourage your visitors to stick around and engage with our site.
Exposing visitors to related posts is a great way to encourage your visitors to stick around and engage with our site.
WP Smush.it
Smush.it
optimizes images files to help improve site speed. This plugin strips
meta data from JPEGs, optimises JPEG compression and strips un-used
colours from indexed images.
WPMU DEV took over maintenance of this plugin in 2012 after it sat idle for a while in the WordPress Plugin Repository.
WPMU DEV took over maintenance of this plugin in 2012 after it sat idle for a while in the WordPress Plugin Repository.
BJ Lazy Load
BJ
Lazy Load lets you lazy load selected images, including post images and
thumbnails, Gravatar images and iFrames, and replace content with a
placeholder.
There are some simple settings that allow you to customize how the plugin works, such as choosing a placeholder and skipping images with classes.
This plugin caters to size optimized images, automatically serves scaled down images in responsive designs, and automatically serving hiDPI images for hiDPI screens (like Apple’s retina display).
There are some simple settings that allow you to customize how the plugin works, such as choosing a placeholder and skipping images with classes.
This plugin caters to size optimized images, automatically serves scaled down images in responsive designs, and automatically serving hiDPI images for hiDPI screens (like Apple’s retina display).
WordPress Beta Tester
Every
serious WordPress user/developer should have WordPress Beta Tester.
This plugin automatically updates your install to the latest stable
release or bleeding edge nightly so you can test the latest/upcoming
version of WordPress.
Note: This plugin should not be used on a live site.
Note: This plugin should not be used on a live site.
Duplicator
This popular free plugin allows you to duplicate, clone, backup, move and transfer an entire site from one place to another.
Duplicator is made by developers for developers. It’s a great tool for pulling a production site down onto a local machine for testing, as well as the reverse – developing locally and pushing a site to a production server.
Duplicator has racked up more than 480,000 downloads and has received an average rating of 4.9 stars on the WordPress Plugin Repository. Duplicator gets a thumbs up from me, too. This is a great plugin.
Duplicator is made by developers for developers. It’s a great tool for pulling a production site down onto a local machine for testing, as well as the reverse – developing locally and pushing a site to a production server.
Duplicator has racked up more than 480,000 downloads and has received an average rating of 4.9 stars on the WordPress Plugin Repository. Duplicator gets a thumbs up from me, too. This is a great plugin.
Infinite SEO
Infinite
SEO is our powerful WordPress SEO plugin. It allow you to easily boost
your site’s ranking through comprehensive and powerful site maps, and
title and meta data optimisation, as well as automatic site-wide linking
and complete Moz integration.
Floating Social
Floating
Social follows users as they scroll through your site, allowing them to
easily share your content on social media no matter where they are on
the page.
We use Floating Social on the WPMU DEV Blog on all our posts to encourage readers to share our content.
We use Floating Social on the WPMU DEV Blog on all our posts to encourage readers to share our content.
WordPress Reset
Resetting
your WordPress site can be useful if you are testing out a bunch of
plugins and themes and want to reset your test environment to clear out
the options table along with everything else.
WordPress Reset resets your WordPress database back to its defaults, deleting all customizations and content.
WordPress Reset resets your WordPress database back to its defaults, deleting all customizations and content.
Relevanssi
Relevanssi
replaces the default search on your site with a partial-match search
that sorts through results by relevance. It also indexes comments and
shortcode content.
This plugin features search results sorted by relevance and not by date, and the ability to match partial words if complete words don’t match.
This is the free version of Relevanssi. Relevanssi Premium has added features.
This plugin features search results sorted by relevance and not by date, and the ability to match partial words if complete words don’t match.
This is the free version of Relevanssi. Relevanssi Premium has added features.
Theme Check
Test your themes to make their they conform with the latest WordPress theme review standards.
Theme Check allows you to run all the same automated testing tools on your theme that WordPress.org uses to review theme submissions.
Theme Check allows you to run all the same automated testing tools on your theme that WordPress.org uses to review theme submissions.
Broken Link Checker
This
plugin’s name is self-explanatory. Check your posts, pages and comments
for broken links and receive notifications by email or on your
dashboard.
You can also choose to prevents search engines from following broken links.
You can also choose to prevents search engines from following broken links.
Disable Comments
Disable
Comments allows you to disable comments on any post type (posts, pages
attachments etc) across your network so your users can’t override the
settings for individual posts.
This plugin is great if you run a Multisite network with sites that don’t require comments.
This plugin is great if you run a Multisite network with sites that don’t require comments.
Regenerate Thumbnails
Regenerate
Thumbnails allows you to quickly and easily regenerate the thumbnails
for all of your image attachments. This is especially helpful if you’ve
changed your WordPress theme and you need different-sized thumbnails or
featured images.
A great alternative is AJAX Thumbnail Rebuild, which is great for sites with lots of images as it allows you to rebuild images in multi-steps rather then in one shot, placing less stress on your serve.
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Source by :- http://premium.wpmudev.org/blog/25-must-have-wordpress-plugins-for-2014/
A great alternative is AJAX Thumbnail Rebuild, which is great for sites with lots of images as it allows you to rebuild images in multi-steps rather then in one shot, placing less stress on your serve.
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Source by :- http://premium.wpmudev.org/blog/25-must-have-wordpress-plugins-for-2014/
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